Gawd, I woke up this morning to find an over flowing mailbox, more
posts than a good old slanging match over C vs C++ 
There’s been an interesting mix of religious views about software
libre, interspersed with some good observations regarding the pros
and cons. Since it seems a free for all, I might as well add my own comments.
As a developer and architect, over the last ten years perhaps the
most annoying thing I’ve come across with respect to Linux is that
when designing products the management types that don’t actually know
anything about software stand up and spout the one thing they do know
A number of times I’ve seen this as the first and most critical
decision made about a project. The consequences often mount up
considerably leading the same management to ask the question - “Why
are we spending so much getting this ‘free’ software to work ?”
Just like scanning the Bible to find support or condemnation about
entrenched positions such as homosexuality, punishment for crime or
creationism, one can find parts of the Linux project to support
almost any position. The reality is that like most human endeavours
some bits are good, some bits are terrible and the majority is just mediocre.
Even when massaging an ego by contributing to a project to ‘save the
world from evil’ most programmers are typical humans and are
naturally lazy when it comes to things like testing non-mainstream
cases and documentation, hence the mediocrity. Code is generally
good enough for most cases, so no one really cares.
I’m not saying that Microsoft doesn’t have the same problems with the
thousands of developers that they employ. However, a commercial O/S
has economic pressures on it to cover more bases. A bug in Windows
generates major headlines and ridicule, a bug in Linux is under the
radar of most press.
As an engineer I appreciate that quite often Linux is a good and easy
building block to start with. But just like a car designer/engineer
I know that some bits of this off the shelf module are not good
enough to properly run the thing I am designing. Some of the
critical components need to be re-engineered to my own standards and
requirements. (Back to cars: Ford probably has a standard software
package for engine management, but the engineers on the Lotus Esprit
will rewrite more parts for their requirements than those working on
the Focus.)
The argument about Linux and it being free depends on how one is
using it. If you want to appear cool at school or college by
throwing out Windows in order to make an anti-capitalist statement,
then Linux is available to you to run your computer for free. On the
other hand, as a business designing and building products Linux
really isn’t free. For sure, as a bootstrap to a project it is
initially free but then one expends time and money putting added
value in to it that will eventually make your customers eager to part
with $$$. Just look at VMware.
I can understand some of Bill’s frustration about Linux moving in to
the embedded market, it is often a very good starting point for
engineering a device. But it is virtually impossible for someone to
plonk Linux in a device and have the thing perform the requirements
of the device without someone performing value add development on it
to a greater or lesser degree.
This may well have pushed Bill out, but it is the way of the
world. Twice in the 90’s I worked in market segments that at one
time thrived but withered away because the technology moved to where
it was supposed to be - native in the O/S.
The belief that free software will oust Windows from the desktop is a
religious position that I don’t have much truck with. Neither do I
agree that free software is intrinsically evil, though one can
question some of the motives of people wanting all software to be
free as some sort of enshrined human right.
So as an engineer I try to be agnostic and find the best tool for the
job and I can acknowledge the fact that Linux has its place alongside
all the other tools in the box. In fact significant parts of my fun
- where I can turn from engineer to artist - is getting the Windows
bits and the Linux bits happily integrated in to a single working product.
The world changes, adapt or die.
Cheers,
Mark.
